“Fact No. 1.— About four million women in the United States have full political rights.”

“Fact No. 4.— In the male suffrage states only about sixty to sixty-five per cent of the men vote, whereas in the equal suffrage states from seventy to ninety per cent of the women vote, and, as a rule, the men’s vote is higher also.”

“Fact. No. 5.— … the women are public spirited and take an intelligent interest in public affairs… the vote of disreputable women is a negligible factor.”

“Fact. No 10.— California, Washington and Colorado are the only states in the Union which have eight-hour laws for working women...”

“Fact No. 11. — Washington, California, Oregon, Colorado and Utah have provisions enabling the authorities to fix a minimum wage for women. Of the other four equal suffrage states three have practically no women employed in industry…”

“Fact No. 16.— A number of the most progressive and enlightened countries of the world—Norway, Finland, Iceland, Australia, New Zealand and the Isle of Man—have given full suffrage to women.”

“Fact No. 20.— Not one country, state or community which has granted women any measure of suffrage has ever permanently taken it away; but, on the contrary, has enlarged and extended it.”

Historical Background

In 1848, the first major women’s rights convention was held in Seneca Falls, New York, in 1848, and two years later the first annual national suffrage conventions took place. After being interrupted by the Civil War, in 1866, the American Equal Rights Association was formed, but the movement soon splintered. Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and others opposed the proposed Fifteenth Amendment, which gave the franchise to African American men but not to any women. (Many of the Amendment’s supporters, including Frederick Douglass, favored women’s suffrage as well, but they argued that the vote was a matter of life or death for African Americans, who could not afford to wait to persuade more people on women’s suffrage).

In 1869, feeling that male leaders had betrayed women’s interests, the National Woman Suffrage Association (NWSA) was formed in New York City, while Lucy Stone and others formed the American Woman Suffrage Association in Boston. In 1890, the two organizations merged to become the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA). Between 1912 and 1915, the NAWSA updated this broadsheet several times. A later edition, for example, included a report after March 19, 1914, when the 19th Amendment fell 11 votes short of the necessary two-thirds majority in the Senate. In June 1919, Congress finally passed the Amendment, which was ratified in August 1920.